The World We Knew

Happy Monday! And since it is a Monday and the beginning of the week, what better way to make your life a beautiful ray of glorious sunshine than to continue our countdown? Because, that’s right, we have only 8 more days to go!!

Ol’ Blue Eyes Is Back came out in 1973 and was a massive success.

Yesterday we talked about the fabulous 1960’s and Frank’s massive success. Today we’ll be moving on to the 1970’s. The 1970’s were a very interesting time in Frank’s life, and that’s really the only way I can describe it honestly. In 1970, at the age of 55, Frank announced to the world that he was ready to retire after 36 years in show business. He did his last recordings, and one last show, and with that he left the stage. It seems though, that even Frank knew it wouldn’t last. When you are as huge and iconic as that, I guess that you never really retire. Frank realized that he missed it, and that perhaps he wasn’t ready to retire after all. That’s why, only a few years later in 1973, Frank came out with a brand new album entitled Ol’ Blue Eyes is Back. It was received very, very well, of course. A critic even wrote something along the lines of, “We thought that we were done writing love letters to Frank Sinatra, but here we go again…” The album quickly reached gold status.

The 1970’s and 1980’s were when Frank began touring much more than he’d ever done before, and I think it was a wonderful thing for the world. It was also when Barbara Marx came into his life, and with that we’ve got an absolutely wonderful love story.

Frank and Barbara on their wedding day in 1976.

Barbara was married to Zeppo Marx when she met Frank, they were neighbors across the gold course in Palm Springs. Barbara was 26 years younger than her husband. In her autobiography My Life With Frank, she talks about her marriage to Zeppo. She truly loved him, and he had been her knight in shining armor in so many ways. She had a son from a previous marriage and had carted him all over trying to make a life for them. I’ll tell you that I don’t necessarily agree with how their marriage ended and everything, but I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, at the end of the day it isn’t really my job to talk about it that way. None of us will ever know the whole truth about what happened. But nevertheless, Frank and Barbara began a relationship. She traveled the world with him and was basically his constant companion. After five years, they were finally married in 1976.

Their wedding day marked the beginning of a 22 year marriage. Reading Barbara’s autobiography, you cannot help but be touched by their story. She talks about how much she loved Frank and what it was like to be his wife. Barbara basically never left Frank’s side. Many though that she was just a gold digger because she was 14 years younger than Frank, but it is clear that this wasn’t the case. Going past all of the controversy, though, the life they lived was in incredible one. Frank’s song Nothing But the Best talks about going traveling and dining with kings. Well, that was exactly what he and Barbara did. The world was before them on a red carpet, it seemed. Every summer they visited Monaco and stayed with Princess Grace and Prince Rainier. Not only did Frank continue to have massive amounts of success worldwide, but life was full of traveling and meeting kings and queens. And of course, a beautiful love story.